“The ideas, many of which will unfold through years of engaged political work, need not be perfect, for in the end, it will be the hard, creative work of the communities that take them on. That work is the concrete manifestation of political imagination.”
- Lewis Gordan
Concealed in the corner of the exit (or entrance, depending on which route you take) of Nolan Oswald Dennis‘ current exhibition at Zeitz MOCAA, Understudies, lies an intriguing sculpture: a large inflated ball. The artwork, titled, Model for a Gasp, stands suspended from the ceiling, veiled in cowrie shells, inflating and deflating, letting out a tiny croak as the ball grows and shrinks, almost like the sound of an old man with smoked-out lungs. Together, with the sound of the shells clanging against each other in a soft discongruent tune, there’s a ghostly feeling that fills the room.
Understudies bears the weight of forgotten histories from the Global South, intricately weaving these narratives into the framework of western cosmology and geology. Entering the room that houses Black Liberation Zodiac (Molalatladi), these intertwined narratives come alive. From the name itself, Molalatladi – a Setswana word that refers to the Milky Way – references the galaxy within which we are situated, but also alludes to the obscure texture of scientific study that appears to hold an objective truth, while a wealth of cultural and spiritual knowledge lingers beneath the surface. Nolan blurs disciplinary boundaries to unearth these undercurrents.
“I think about science as a cultural enterprise,” Nolan said in a discussion at the opening of the exhibition. “It’s not just about discovering the ‘natural phenomena in the world’, it’s about making sense of that: a world outside of ourselves. And make sense as something that is made always in relation to whoever is making sense. It’s determined by the languages that we use to make sense. It’s determined by the locations that we are translating the world from.”
In Black Liberation Zodiac (Molalatladi), Nolan remaps the constellations using iconography from Black liberation movements to reposition astrology from an African and Global South perspective. In this way, they invert western knowledge systems, both metaphorically through references to Black history, and physically by flipping the map upside down, positioned along a South-North axis – staying true to the artist’s longstanding commitment to critiquing dominant scientific narratives and mythologies that assume hegemony. This works further to reclaim subaltern histories and knowledge by imbedding them into western epistemology.
But more than that, the reversed map alludes to a feeling of loss and misdirection – a theme that runs subtly throughout the exhibition. Before entering the veiled room that houses Black Liberation Zodiac, another of Nolan’s works, Cabinet of Solidarities, stands facing the room. The literal cabinet holds a variety of collected items – planet-shaped erasers, rocks, sand in bottles – presenting a voyeuristic display, referencing colonial cabinets of curiosities, where European collectors sought to categorise and appropriate cultural objects under the guise of scientific inquiry. These seemingly random objects evoke a sense of personal narrative while simultaneously feeling detached from the individual, as though rendered solely for scientific study.
Placed across from each other, Nolan sets up for a dialogue between the artworks to follow. Yet the veil that separates Black Liberation Zodiac disrupts this conversation, and breeds further isolation with its blacked-out walls and dim lighting.
Nolan’s work is punctuated with archives from Black and African liberation movements. Drawing on geological techniques and scientific research, Nolan criticises colonial traces within western knowledge systems and aims to reposition it from an African lens. This calls upon a sense of “epistemic disobedience”, encouraging viewers to read through ideas of space and question who this knowledge is intended for and where this knowledge is created from. Walter D Mignolo, who coined the term, explains that epistemic disobedience “takes us to a different place, to a different ‘beginning.’” Nolan achieves this through merging scientific research with ‘subaltern’ histories and alternative modes of knowledge, drawing on spiritual myths and cultural objects, to entangle and blur the imagined boundaries between western and indigenous discourse.
While most of the artworks appear to be invested in theory, sitting with the pieces a moment longer, a feeling of loss creeps out, almost as though seeking a sense of belonging. Ending the show with Model for a Gasp brings us back to the personal. Nolan manages to capture a sense of spiritual loss within the gaps of history, and reminds us that despite the decades of decolonial work, of reclaiming and repositioning histories, the wounds of colonisation still ache.
Understudies is not just an exploration of colonial traces in scientific study, but an exploration of the spirit – marred by centuries of destruction, loss and forgetting. And we’re left wondering: how can decolonial work not only recover lost histories but also offer healing to those who inherit these wounds.
UNDERSTUDIES is currently on show at Zeitz MOCAA and will run until May 2025.
Notes:
Lewis Gordon, “Fanon and Development. A Philosophical Look” 2004
Walter D Mignolo, “Epistemic Disobedience and the Decolonial Option: A Manifesto” Transmodernity, 2011.
